


Truth

by anoyo



Category: Cantarella
Genre: Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-13
Updated: 2008-12-13
Packaged: 2017-10-03 05:37:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,325
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anoyo/pseuds/anoyo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chiaro never wanted it to come to "last resorts," but life often does that for which you hope least.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Truth

**Author's Note:**

> Day 12 of my 25 Days of Christmas! This _should_ be historically accurate. Should be. Mostly. Whatevs. Not beta'd, finals have TAKEN OVER. May not actually be wangst? Written for [Sky](http://cerulean-sky.livejournal.com) for her prompt of "wangst." Originally posted [here](http://anoyo.livejournal.com/131808.html).

Over time, Chiaro had found that he was best suited to manual labor. It was calm, relaxing, and simple. There were no epic battles, women to love and lose in terrible ways, men to love and lose in worse ways, or tortures to receive to both heart and soul. Simple. If a man shot another man, he was lynched. If you betrayed your best friend, or your wife, revenge was taken. If there was subterfuge, Chiaro did not see it, nor did he partake of it. Comfortable.

There were times when he felt things, or saw things, twinges of where a piece of his soul might never return from, visions of the soul of a little boy, fainter and fainter every time its sad eyes watched him. It no longer beckoned.

At times like these, Chiaro would feel the hole in himself, the pit of his own destruction, pain, agony, and he would turn away, because that was all he had left in him to do.

He could no longer live his life for Cesare.

It didn't take as long as Chiaro had thought for Cesare's soul to stop visiting him at all. The last time he saw it was the first time it had tried to speak with him in a very long time; all it managed was a weak, "I'm sorry." The heartstrings it might have pulled had long since been broken, or stolen, or stretched so far as to no longer feel any pain.

Chiaro went on with his work, a hired hand on a small dairy farm, churning butter, milking cows, fixing fences, and other such tasks. Went on with his work as long as he could, letting it absorb him, take away the rest of him, all that he had left. Perhaps, then, his conscience would abate. Perhaps.

Comfort, simplicity, and removal were not to be Chiaro's allowance, however. After months of feeling nothing, beginning to be able to move on, away from Cesare's dark lure, he began to feel the twinges again. Softly, at first, a tug on something to essentially him that even the softest pull was noticeable. Then, they began to pull harder, and harder, until Chiaro felt physical pain until he allowed himself to wonder, one brief snatch, Cesare? One name, and the pain left him, replaced only with a burning, trembling pull. A summons, clear as day.

And for its clarity, Chiaro could only ignore it for a few hours before he packed what meager belongings he needed, left a note that thanked and asked forgiveness all at once, and stole away into the night. He paid for a horse and rode directly to Viana, following the pull to its source.

News had reached him of the siege, and whispers of the presence of Cesare had apparently not been entirely irrational. He had heard of Cesare's exile, and of the Lady Lucrezia's seizure, but he had attempted to filter out as much as he could. To know only in the most vague terms.

It didn't matter. Whether he followed Cesare's every footstep, he should have known that he would be drawn back someday. Were he honest with himself, he might have even admitted to anticipating being drawn back.

Whispers of, _Perhaps I will be beloved_, and _Perhaps I can make a difference this time_ floated in his head now as they had every time before. Cesare was like a bad drug, an addiction, where every time he believed it would change, and yet it never did. Fool me thrice, perhaps it's meant to be.

Chiaro had no difficulty making it into Viana, besieged or no, using skills that lingered with him no matter what he did. The idea that perhaps Cesare was purposefully keeping himself inside was quickly banished as Chiaro ran through the streets, blending in perfectly. It took him one arms robbery to gain a sword, and a couple quick thrusts to assure himself that he still had the ability to do whatever was needed, in any circumstances.

The whispers in the city were not so easy to avoid as the whispers in the countryside of another duchy; Cesare was a mad ruler, crazed, cruel, beautiful. The rumors led Chiaro directly to Cesare's residence, one of the city's strongholds, though the pull within him would have led him just as surely.

He could feel it immediately. The building itself was rancid, reeking the stink of malevolence. It permeated everything, drew shadows out of corners, and may have unsheathed Chiaro's sword on its own. There was a look of recognition on Cesare's face only after the blade drove itself through his heart, only after Chiaro could see, tangible or otherwise, the demon pull itself from Cesare's flesh, failing to heal its host.

Failing because Chiaro was there, diminishing its presence. Somehow, despite the sword in his hand, the sword that had too easily slid through flesh and organ, the fact that his mere presence had ceased the demon's ability to sustain itself made this death echo more keenly within him than any other.

The recognition grew in Cesare's eyes, neck-and-neck with the glossy sheen of the dying. A grip on Chiaro's arm, meant to be strong, steadying, but in reality weak and failing, and Chiaro felt Cesare draw a labored breath more intensely as he caught the man's weight.

"Thank you," Cesare breathed, words almost inaudible. "Only you could save me." Each word came between a breath, and breaths came further and further apart. Until they ceased.

Chiaro marveled at the blood still running down Cesare's clothes, Chiaro's arms, even after he had stopped breathing. _Stopped living_. Marveled at the body's ability to do the nonsensical when nature screamed only for sense.

Death hit him like a chill breeze, the first of the winter season, as he thought he saw the child's spirit one last time, a single tear on its cheek and thankfulness in its eyes. He dropped to his knees, pulling Cesare's body against him. The sword, still embedded, caught against the floor, and began to slide back out of Cesare's body, easy as it had gone in. Chiaro grabbed the hilt, pulled it out entirely, and tossed it away from himself as tears ran from his eyes. Tears for himself, tears for Cesare, tears for what could have been greatness.

Guilt, blame, hatred, love, fear, pain; all of these passed through his tears until he could no longer feel any of them, only a deadly calm. Like the lull of a storm, it brought with it perspective, and a strange understanding.

Somehow, he knew his time to mourn was over, and that guards would soon come.

Somehow, he knew that he would never be able to forget Cesare, but that he would be able to continue to live.

Somehow, he knew what to say, after years of silence.

"I didn't save you," Chiaro said softly, laying Cesare down on an ornate rug, already bloodstained. He placed him in the Catholic position, praying for admission to heaven. Chiaro didn't know if that prayer was even possible. "You only let me help you save yourself," Chiaro continued, the feeling drained from him, words not trite or emotional, but true. "One person can never truly save another, it is always that other's duty to indulge his 'savior's' altruistic ideations, and quietly save himself." A small smile grew on Chiaro's lips as he took a few steps back, grabbed for the candle that lit Cesare's desk. "What, then, becomes of the false savior's shallow victory?"

He threw the candle to the ground, watching it catch easily on the rug and floor, reaching the skirt of the bed almost instantly. The room ablaze, Chiaro turned to go, walking away calmly, covered in Cesare's blood. He would live. The piece of his soul Cesare had held was forever gone from him, but he had the rest, and he had many years in which to realize that soul.


End file.
